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Watson Whore gets him hot.
Sure, it's trash television. He cannot listen to the actual dialogue for too long before feeling his IQ physically dropping, and now it even has the added effect of replaying Johnny's judgemental sighing in his head as soon as it starts, but still.
It's a hot manslut on TV. V's tastes aren't that complicated.
Kerry knows it. Heck, they marathon-ed some of it and got some good couch sex from it. Kerry -knows-. So V gets the face his input is doing now. Fuck, he almost feels embarrassed.
"You're not in the mood?"
"Yeah... Just.. a long day, Ker."
He is usually better with words. Kerry's face is doing things to him. Something uncomfortable curling in his stomach, heat rising from his neck that he refuses to acknowledge.
Then Kerry dismounts his lap, and the electric current in the air distorts like an out-of-tune guitar, cutting, iron-tasting and pulsating.
Fuck.
V rubs his face, sits a bit straighter on the bed, forces himself to cut his shame-panic-anger to the core, make it shut up -make it all easy again, make it so maybe they can forget the moment their evening went to shit and just pretend everything is ok again.
He can feel the tension on Kerry's shoulders; the only thing he can truly see from where the rocker boy has turned his back on him, seated on the edge of V's bed, the TV blaring commercials in the background.
V doesn't push it, knows Kerry needs his walls and defenses just like he does.
"Had a lot of long days lately, V."
He feels like a cheating husband, or like an unaccommodating wife; lets himself wonder if he's good enough for this, for Kerry, before forcing himself to snap out of it. He owns Kerry to be fucking functional and not spiral, at the very fucking least.
"Sorry. The Afterlife has been sucking me dry, I'll get better with handling it all. It's just. Lot on my plate."
He snorts; a mean, almost quiet vibrato to it. "Yeah. No one else "sucking you dry", V?"
There's sarcasm there, an edge that claws painfully at V's walls, the taste of blood growing familiar at the back of his throat.
He knows how Johnny would have reacted. He can feel it, pulsing under his skin, his fears something alive, warlike, ready to die fighting.
Pushing it back is like swallowing sand, and V is left shivering.
"I don't know what.. what the fuck you want me to answer to that."
Kerry turns back toward him like a viper ready to strike. V's hands fist the sheets, his heartbeat bleeding in his ears, knowing he can neither fight nor fly and hope to salvage this conversation.
"What the fuck is wrong with you, V?"
And V deflates.
It's not even angry. It's not a slap, a bite, a punch. It's not cruel, it's not mean. It's worry and care and ache and frustration. (It's more than he deserves.)
"I.." Where to even start.
The dying? The nightmares? The devouring empty place inside him? The fear. The thought of losing the very last battle he couldn't afford to lose.
It's all the reasons they have been fighting, as days became weeks, became months. A silent ticking fraying their nerves, spiraling, snowballing.
"I.. Vik got me some new medicine. For the headaches." It's stupid, that today's metaphorical last straw is this. He doesn't really know what it tells about them, about him. That of all the reasons to feel defective today's uncomfortable pick was this. It's stupid, and fuck, the whole thing just a lot of additional stuff Kerry doesn't deserve. "Can't really... it makes it harder to get hard."
Kerry is way better at this than he is. He'll never stop being grateful for it.
He feels the dry, familiar warmth of his fingers gently, oh so gently, reaching his for nape, light, playing with the short hair there. Kerry doesn't try to brush the hair from his face, doesn't coax him to meet his eyes, just his warm hand, a caress, some comfort. A reminder he's there.
They are both so tired, and yet Kerry still takes the time. To be there. (To love him.)
"Would have been nice to know." He eventually says, after a moment of silence, both getting rid of the out-key distortion in their ears. Not cruelly. Simple truth.
"Sorry."
V's arm finds the curve of Kerry's body, moves them closer the each other, the comfort of Kerry's skin to his immediate. They shift until they can lay facing each other, legs slowly intertwining, naturally coming together.
"I'm not cheating," adds V, not fully ready to let go of that particular one.
"I know. I'm sorry."
Their foreheads touch, each breathing into the other, each other's rock in the storm.
"Talk to me, V," it's an old tune, one that breaks their hearts every time. "Please."
V shivers, shuts his eyes against the assault of bile, shuts his eyes so maybe it will stop Kerry from seeing all the darkness V has inside, all the monsters he's trying to keep at bay.
Kerry, charitably, lets him.
His lips on him are something he can't compare to past lovers. It's foolish, to believe in a higher power for this, and not for coming back from the dead, but this, this he can understand how people could bleed themselves dry with words, songs, poems, and still not being able to pin it down.
'Dark Matter', called it Kerry, in that song of his (of theirs). This love of theirs.
"I'm scared," mumbles V against Kerry's mouth. Almost whines, something quiet and raw as Kerry's hands travel his body in slow, rough, meaningful caresses.
The unsaid weighs heavy. A cloak of darkness, a world outside waiting to eat them whole.
Kerry kisses his neck, his stubble making V's skin tingle, alighting with warmth. V's fingers find the dark silver of his hair, relishing the burn, asking for more.
"I'll drive the shadows away," whispers Kerry, V's heartbeat aching between them, caught by Kerry's tongue against his jugular. A promise, and V lets him steal his heart away. (He'll save his life to give it to Kerry.)